- Letters: I/ADELMV
- Words: 77
- Points: 306
- Pangrams: 1
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The table provides clues for the roots of words in today's NY Times Spelling Bee. You're responsible for prefixes, suffixes,
tense changes, plurals, doubling consonants before suffixes, and alternate spellings of roots. An exception:
since Sam won't allow S, when the root contains an S, the clue may be for a plural or suffixed form. "Mice" for example.
If a clue isn't self-explanatory, try googling it. And if AI tries to be too helpful, try prefixing your search with "word for" or "word meaning".
The TL;DR about the site comes after the table.
Past clues are available here |
Today's puzzle
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Table content
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| answers covered | answer's first letter | answer's length | clue for root (answer may need prefix, suffix, tense change, alt spelling, ...) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | 5 | Help |
| 1 | A | 4 | Assistant to an important person, esp. military or political (…-de-camp), noun |
| 1 | A | 5 | Be sick |
| 1 | A | 5 | Point at a target |
| 1 | A | 6 | Friend (person, country) who joins you for a common purpose in a conflict, noun/verb |
| 1 | A | 4 | Surrounded by, preposition |
| 2 | A | 5,7 | Make use of (… yourself of), or use (to no …) |
| 1 | A | 4 | Eager for or enthusisatic about (… reader) |
| 1 | A | 5 | Exist, verb; or not on tape (TV show), adj. |
| 1 | D | 7 | Move slowly, or have casual sex with, gerund form is a pangram |
| 1 | D | 4 | Place to get cold cuts |
| 2 | D | 5,7 | Evil spirit; or Satan; or prepare a hard-boiled egg dish that involves splitting the egg, mixing the yolk with mustard and spices, and putting it back in the white, verb, gerund form is a pangram |
| 1 | D | 6 | Jeweled crown or headband worn as a symbol of sovereignty |
| 2 | D | 4,6 | What you turn on a rotary phone or radio knob (don't touch that …!) |
| 2 | D | 6,7 | Pass time aimlessly or unproductively |
| 1 | D | 4 | Cease to live |
| 1 | D | 7 | Difficult choice between undesirable options |
| 1 | D | 4 | Pickle spice |
| 1 | D | 6 | Faintly lit, adjective/verb |
| 1 | D | 4 | Coin worth 10 cents |
| 1 | D | 4 | Famous female opera singer; self-important person who is temperamental and difficult to please |
| 2 | D | 4,5 | Jump headfirst into water |
| 2 | D | 6,7 | Separate into parts, or ÷ arithmetic operation |
| 1 | D | 7 | Break into parts for sharing (… up the proceeds) |
| 1 | E | 6 | Water swirl, NOT clothier Bauer |
| 2 | E | 5,6 | Leave out a sound or syllable when speaking |
| 2 | E | 5,7 | Letter sent via the internet (with Outlook?), noun/verb |
| 1 | E | 4 | Wicked (ELO’s “… Woman”, Santana's "… Ways") |
| 1 | I | 4 | Thought or suggestion (here’s a new …), noun |
| 1 | I | 5 | Perfect, adj./verb |
| 2 | I | 4,5 | Not doing anything; or, said of an engine, running but not in gear |
| 1 | I | 4 | Prayer leader at mosque |
| 1 | I | 5 | Climbing plant with shiny, dark green five-pointed leaves (… League) |
| 1 | L | 6 | Young ♂, Scottish |
| 1 | L | 4 | Put something down |
| 1 | L | 6 | Impose a tax, homophone of embankment above, verb |
| 1 | L | 6 | Cover for the top of a jar; or skin that covers your eye |
| 1 | L | 4 | Be in a horizontal resting position, or say something false |
| 1 | L | 4 | Peru capital, or bean |
| 1 | L | 4 | Small green citrus fruit |
| 1 | L | 7 | Drink made from citrus fruit with green skin |
| 2 | L | 4,5 | Exist, verb; or not on tape (TV show), adj. |
| 1 | L | 5 | Furiously angry |
| 1 | M | 4 | 8 of them were milking in a Xmas carol |
| 2 | M | 4,6 | Letters you get or send |
| 2 | M | 4,6 | Permanently injure |
| 1 | M | 5 | Mass communication |
| 1 | M | 6 | Situated near the center, adj. |
| 1 | M | 8 | relating to the Middle Ages, pangram |
| 1 | M | 6 | Between the edges (… of the road) |
| 1 | M | 4 | Computer music protocol, calf-length skirt, or noon in French |
| 1 | M | 4 | Not severe (a … case of the flu), or gentle (Clark Kent, the …-mannered reporter) |
| 1 | M | 4 | 5,280 feet, or 1.6 km |
| 2 | M | 4,6 | Wheat or pepper grinder |
| 2 | M | 4,5 | Silent performer |
| 1 | V | 5 | Having a sound basis in logic or fact; legally binding, one of its negated forms is a pangram, and so is its noun form meaning the state of having a sound basis |
| 2 | V | 4,6 | Bride’s face covering |
| 1 | V | 4 | Small glass container (… of poison), NOT despicable |
| 1 | V | 4 | Compete eagerly |
| 1 | V | 4 | Despicable, NOT a small glass container; adj. |
| 1 | V | 5 | Large & luxurious country house (Roman …) |
| 1 | V | 5 | Producing powerful feelings or strong, clear images in the mind (a … memory); or, of a color, intensely deep or bright |
This site provides clues for a day's New York Times Spelling Bee puzzle. It follows in Kevin Davis' footsteps. The original set of 4,500 clues came from him, and they still make up about three quarters of the current clue set.
The "Bee Roots" approach is to provide explicit clues for root words, not every word. As logophiles, we are pretty good at putting on prefixes and suffixes, changing tense, and forming plurals (including Latin plurals!). The clues cover root words, arranged alphabetically by root word, with a count of words in the puzzle that come from each root. For example, if a puzzle includes ROAM and ROAMING, there will be a clue for ROAM and a count of 2. The root may not appear in the puzzle at all; for example, the 2021-07-23 Bee included ICED, DEICE, and DEICED. For such a puzzle, the clue would be for ICE with a word count of 3.
The Bee Roots approach involves judgement sometimes. For example, if a puzzle includes LOVE, LOVED, and LOVELY, how many roots are needed to cover them? LOVE and LOVED share the root LOVE, certainly, but LOVELY is tricky. LOVE is part of its etymology, but by now, the word means "exquisitely beautiful," which is a lot farther from the meaning of LOVE than swithcing to past tense. I'm inclined to treat LOVE and LOVELY as separate roots. You may not agree, which is fine. Another thing we logophiles share is a LOVE of arguing about words on social media.
A few words can have one meaning as a suffixed form and another as a stand-alone word. EVENING, for example. In those cases I will use the meaning that I think is more common.
One last complication, until another one pops up: a few roots have multiple spellings, for example LOLLYGAG and LALLYGAG. Depending on the day's letters, and maybe even the editor's whims, one or both could be in the puzzle's answer list. With such roots, you could see a word count of 2, even if there are no applicable prefixes or suffixes.
I will do my best to keep this site up to date and helpful (I hope). Check it out, and tweet feedback to @donswartwout Tweet to @donswartwout